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BARTON COLUMN: Dueling for D.A.

Chatham County voters abhor change when it comes to their district attorney.

The last time an incumbent D.A. lost his seat here was in 1980. That’s the same year Ronald Reagan knocked off Jimmy Carter for president.

The winner that year? Spencer Lawton Jr.

He defeated 16-year incumbent Andrew J. “Bubsy” Ryan III in a rock-’em, sock-’em Democratic primary runoff election, then went on to beat Republican Bob Davis in the general election.

Lawton kept the seat for 28 years, easily fending off the occasional challenger — including Ryan, who emerged again as a candidate in 1988. When Lawton retired in 2008, Larry Chisolm ran for the post in a wide open race. He won, riding the coattails of a huge Democratic turnout in Chatham County for Barack Obama.

Chisolm hopes for a rerun this year, despite his woeful record as an administrator and his office’s mishandling of some high-profile criminal cases. The question is whether enough of the electorate — especially Democrats — have been paying attention to his performance.

According to last month’s Democratic primary numbers, it seems many are.

On the surface, it appeared that Chisolm smoked challenger Zena McClain in the July 31 primary. But this is one time when appearances are deceiving.

But if you look at McClain’s numbers and compare them to the wide open Democratic primary for D.A. four years ago, she has a lot to be proud of.

In 2008, she got just 2,560 votes — a paltry 16 percent — in a four-person race for the Democratic nomination. Chisolm got exactly 7,000 votes, or 44 percent. (Chisolm would go on to beat Jerry Rothschild in the runoff, then defeat Republican David Lock in November to win the seat.)

It’s next to impossible for a challenger — especially one like McClain who had almost no money and who had lost two previous races for public office — to knock off an entrenched incumbent in a countywide primary contest. That’s the power of incumbency.

But McClain more than doubled her vote total from four years ago. That’s astounding. She even won a few precincts (First Presbyterian Church on Washington Avenue and the JEA on Abercorn Street).

In contract, Chisolm improved by just 3,000 in head-to-head competition with McClain. For someone who has had the job for almost four years, that’s nothing to crow about.

McClain’s gain is evidence of an anti-Chisolm backlash. It appears a sizable number of Democratic voters are seriously questioning Chisolm’s ability to run this important office. That’s not good news for the incumbent — and it suggests an opening for Heap.

If enough Democrats have soured on Chisolm’s poor performance and decide to sit this race out, and Heap can energize the Republican base and get it to turn out in November, then she has a chance to do what Spencer Lawton did more than 30 years ago — knock an incumbent D.A. out of the job.

In the 1980 race, Bubsy Ryan — sadly, there are few colorful nicknames like this in local politics these days — was bloodied in a three-way Democrat primary race with Lawton and Steve Yekel.The attacks were blistering and personal. They continued into the runoff between Lawton and Ryan, who said the D.A.’s office is no place for on-the-job training.

To which Lawton replied: “I couldn’t agree more. Sixteen years is long enough; we ought to put a stop to it.”

Chatham County has had almost four years of Chisolm. Is that long enough?